This invention relates to a craft interface device for executing maintenance and provisioning operations in a telecommunications system, This also invention relates to an associated method.
A Litespan(trademark)-type telecommunications system is a group of one or more Litespan(trademark) terminals connected together, for example, in a chain configuration by optical fiber. Each Litespan(trademark) terminal comprises a rack or other enclosure with multiple banks each having a printed circuit board xe2x80x9cbackplane.xe2x80x9d These printed circuit boards each have a plurality, e.g., sixty-five, of numerically ordered slots in which various cards, such as fiber cards and subscriber line cards, are vertically disposed.
Each Litespan(trademark) terminal includes a common control (CC) bank and a number of subscriber banks (fiber banks, channel banks) for various kinds of fiber connections and various kinds of subscriber drops such as POTS, ISDN, HFC, etc. A fiber bank includes one backplane, power supplies, plug-in bank control units and fiber cards. A channel bank includes a single backplane, power supplies, plug-in bank control units and subscriber line cards. Each remote terminal (RT) access multiplexer communicates on one or both sides with a fiber span and may also include various types of subscriber drops. A local telephone company can begin operations with rack shelves only partially filled with backplanes and with the backplane slots only partially occupied and fill in the remaining backplanes and slots as the number of subscribers and service requirements increase.
In a Central Office (CO) of a telephone company, one terminal, called the Central Office Terminal (COT), has an interface to a digital cross-connect switch (DCS) and communicates with the chain of remote terminals (RT""s) through one or two fiber spans. The remote terminals are typically located at geographically diverse locations in order to bring telecommunications service to different service areas.
Terminals can also include Broadband Fiber Banks (BFB""s) which connect on one side to the terminal""s common control and on another side to a number of distribution fibers. The distribution fibers connect to flrther optical network units (ONU""s) such as a so-called xe2x80x9cbrick,xe2x80x9d a Broadband Remote Transceiver (BRX), or a VEX. These ONU""s take fiber on one side and on the other side provide narrowband and broadband services over copper to a number of subscribers.
In order to perform maintenance and provisioning operations on the Litespan(trademark) system, a craftsperson may use a Litecraft(trademark) product, which is a PC-based product which can be plugged into a COT or RT. Upon connection of a Litecraft(trademark) product to a system terminal, for example, via a serial port of the PC and a data link, the Litecraft(trademark) product downloads configuration information from the system using a standard telephony communication language, TL-1, and presents the configuration information graphically to the user, beginning with a top-level diagram of the overall system. This top-level diagram shows a configuration of terminals and their operational relationships or connections to each other. When the user clicks on a component of the system, the Litecraft(trademark) product retrieves information about that component and presents the retrieved information graphically to the user. This presentation is a number of levels deep, enabling the user first to see the overall system, then to see components in an individual terminal, then to see individual access mutiplexers within a terminal, then to see individual cards within an access multiplexer. Moreover, the user can open multiple windows and browse through the entire system independently in each such window.
In order to perform its various tasks, a Litecraft(trademark) product must download extensive configuration information about the system to which it is connected. Such downloading is usually implemented via TL-1 across a serial communications link. The information is obtained from various terminals in the system.
When subscribers sign up for certain kinds of new broadband services, often one or more new permanent virtual paths (PVP""s) or circuits need to be allocated within the Litespan(trademark) system. One end of the path is at the subscriber""s point of access to the system (e.g., on a line card in one of the access multiplexers or ONU""s) and the other end of the path is either at a second subscriber""s point of access to the system (if located within the system""s local service area) or at the DCS (if not located within the system""s local service area). The allocation of paths, which is known as xe2x80x9cpath hunting,xe2x80x9d involves the assignment of various telephony resources within the system including, but not limited to, a communication channel of sufficient capacity on the fiber chain. The assignment of such resources can be a relatively complicated task. For example, the Litespan(trademark) system architecture requires that a communication channel to be assigned to the new path be the same channel assigned on all of the fiber segments in the path. In addition, it is desirable that communication channels remain available for assignment to a now path on other segments which do not overlap with those on which the channel is already assigned.
Conventionally, path hunting is performed manually by craftspeople. A craftsperson manually examines each end terminal and each intermediate terminal disposed along the path between the end terminals to find a single time slot or channel of a synchronous transport signal (STS), level 1 (STS-1), available at all terminals,
In existing craft products, the Litespan(trademark) terminals can perform path hunting automatically for narrowband and wideband services only.
An object of the present invention is to provide a craft interface device for performing maintenance and provisioning operations in a telecommunications network. More particularly, it is an object of the preset invention to provide a craft interface device wherein the establishment of a broadband end-to-end cross-connection is facilitated.
Another object of the present invention is to provide an associated method for establishing a broadband end-to-end cross-connection in a telecommunications network.
A more specific object of the present invention is to provide such a method which is user-friendly, i.e. easy to perform by a user.
These and other objects of the present invention will be apparent from the drawings and descriptions herein.
The present invention is directed to a craft interface device for accessing a telecommunications network having several levels or layers of interactive structure. The craft interface device performs maintenance and provisioning and related operations and comprises a graphical user interface for displaying on a monitor a sequence of graphical representations of operatively interconnected objects in a respective layer of the telecommunications network whereby a user can navigate graphically through the network from a highest hierarchical level of objects to a lowest hierarchical level of objects and operational interrelationships. The graphical user interface is operatively connected to a display interactive user input component (e.g., a mouse) for detecting user selection via the input component of a broadband first end point displayed in a first window by the graphical user interface and a broadband second end point displayed in a second window by the graphical user interface. Connection componentry is operatively connected to the graphical user interface and to the network for automatically establishing a broadband end-to-end cross-connection in the network in response to the user selection via the input component of the first end point and the second end point.
The graphical user interface is operatively connected to the display interactive input device or mouse for detecting an actuation of a button of the mouse when a mouse-controlled pointer on the monitor is at least partially disposed over either the first end point or the second end point.
In accordance with another feature of the present invention the connection componentry is operatively connected to the network via a data link for automatically discovering an available broadband telecommunications path in the telecommunications network between the first end point and the second end point and for automatically reserving the path. This discovery process is implemented by selecting a telecommunications time slot, for instance, an STS-1 slot, which would constitute the path, and automatically dispatching of inquiries over the data link to respective terminals of the network for purposes of determining whether the selected slot is available. Upon receiving affirmations as to slot availability from all terminations along the path from a first terminal including the first end point to a second terminal including the second end point, the connection componentry dispatches messages to the various involved terminals reserving the selected slot to thereby establish the broadband end-to-end cross-connection. Generally, the establishment of the path proceeds in segments: a first message is sent out reserving the selected path within the first end terminal, a second message or pair of messages is dispatched reserving the selected path along a segment between the first end terminal and the nest terminal, and so forth until the path within the second end terminal is reserved. Where there are intervening terminals along the path between the first end terminal and the second end terminal, the connection componentry sends inquiries to those terminals to determine whether the selected time slot is available for pass through. The establishing of the broadband end-to-end cross-connection is conditional upon finding a path or slot which is available for pass through at each of the intervening terminals.
The connection componentry thus includes means for identifying an available STS-1 time slot in an optical carrier at the first end terminal and in an optical cer at the second end terminal and further includes means for checking the intervening terminals, if any, for availability of the STS-1 time slot for pass through in the intervening terminals.
The present invention is also directed to a method for accessing a telecommunications network for purposes of maintenance and provisioning, where the network includes a plurality of levels or layers of interactive structure. The method comprises (1) displaying, on a monitor, a first browser window showing a graphical representation of broadband facilities at a first terminal of the telecommunications network. (2) detecting user selection via a display interactive input component of a broadband first end point displayed in the first browser window, (3) displaying, on the monitor, a second browser window showing a graphical representation of broadband facilities at a second terminal of the telecommunications network, (4) detecting user selection via the display interactive input component of a broadband second end point displayed in the second browser window, and (5) automatically establishing a broadband end-to-end cross-connection in the network in response to the user selection via the input component of the first end point and the second end point.
The establishing of the cross-connection generally includes automatically discovering an available broadband telecommunications path in the network between the first end point and the second end point and automatically reserving the path. More particularly, the establishing of the cross-connection includes automatically identifying an available STS-1 time slot in an optical carrier at the first terminal and in an optical carrier at the second terminal. Where the first terminal and the second terminal are connected to one another via an intervening terminal, the establishing of the cross-connection further includes automatically checking the other terminal for availability of the STS-1 time slot for pass through in the other terminal, and automatically reserving the STS-1 time slot in the first terminal, the second terminal and the other terminal.